Gameplay is NOT more important than graphics.

I don't totally agree with you, but I do agree that graphics are more important than people usually admit, as they add a lot to the syle and atmosphere of the game. No one wants to be constantly reminded that they're playing a video game, and as graphics improve, it becomes much easier to suspend belief.

Deus Ex

It was never a looker. Far from it, yet it's considered as one of the greatest games of all time.

Not to say that graphics are irrelevent, but I think that gameplay and sound matter the most.

mo0ksi

even some games with outdated technology look great, games have to atleast look half decent for me to play them.

There is one game that disagrees:

And many others, too.

THA-TODD-BEAST

Gameplay over Graphics. Now why is that? Gameplay is the primary component of a game. I am not saying graphics are irrelevant; they often had to the effect. Graphics are like icing on a cake. You can eat a cake and still be good, but it's tastier with icing on top, but you can't really eat the icing by itself because it's just too sweet and you will get sick of it really quickly.Luminouslight

despite our belief that gameplay matters the most, graphics remains the single biggest focus for the industry both in terms of hardware development and game designs. personally i don't judge a game by its graphics ( provided it doesn't suck too badly ), but there's no denying that graphics has become the definitive element for contemporary games.

partially true I'd say sure KOTOR 1and 2 is one of the best RPGs I've played even though its graphics were not so good for its time, but it still wasn't ugly.

But on the other hand

Mafia for its time had super graphics, but thats another case because that game had crazy graphics for its time+ the best story ever.

Farcry2 despite what others say I really liked this game and mostly for the colors and how they projected Africa, I like to imagine things and after reading "Things Fall Apart" and watching "Blood Diamond" this game really met my needs.

Dead Space, Amazing graphics, great story, innovative gameplay, what more can I say the best solid horror game I've ever played

I'm tired of reading over and over how gameplay is more important than graphics because it's not. In my experience they must be equal. All of the best games that I have ever played not only had great gameplay but also were totting some of the best graphics for thier time. Think about your favorite games of all time and probably none of them have had bad graphics. Some of my favorites of all time Half-Life series, Goldeneye, Ocarina of Time, Grand Theft Auto Series, Final Fantasy, Bioshock, Crysis. All these games not only had some of the best graphics for thier time but had the gameplay to match it. And an equilibrium of the two is what makes great games turn into classics. 8BaLLCB

I'm tired of reading over and over how gameplay is more important than graphics because it's not. In my experience they must be equal. All of the best games that I have ever played not only had great gameplay but also were totting some of the best graphics for thier time. Think about your favorite games of all time and probably none of them have had bad graphics. Some of my favorites of all time Half-Life series, Goldeneye, Ocarina of Time, Grand Theft Auto Series, Final Fantasy, Bioshock, Crysis. All these games not only had some of the best graphics for thier time but had the gameplay to match it. And an equilibrium of the two is what makes great games turn into classics. 8BaLLCB

It all really depends on the genre of the game, generally. If its a FPS or TPS, then it better have some gorgeous graphics to immerse the players in the environment. The same goes for racing games. These genres require that their gameplay be supported by an equally impressive visuals.

If its a strategy game, graphics will play second fiddle to gameplay. Some turn-based strategy games even require less focus on graphics (games like Hearts of Iron, Civilisation, etc etc).

I disagree. You should include casual games as well, the ones who made their mark on gaming history.

Pac-Man has lousy graphics, but millions upon millions of people plugged quarters into those arcade machines. Then when the computer versions were made, everybody wanted it.

Donkey Kong, same thing.

I don't care about graphics.

One word: Tetris

end of discussion

Regarding Doom and Halo - those games have a great artsty1e. So graphics do matter for them too.

Go ahead and imagine Crysis with Doom's graphics. Fun, eh? Both artsty1e and technical features matter.

I disagree. You should include casual games as well, the ones who made their mark on gaming history.

Pac-Man has lousy graphics, but millions upon millions of people plugged quarters into those arcade machines. Then when the computer versions were made, everybody wanted it.

Donkey Kong, same thing.

topsemag55

camera smoothness and controls are the most important. If it gives you motion sickness, it sucks. Regardless of how good the graphics are.

well. i can say this from start post is both true and false. ya i like a pretty game, and if im just playing say sp. i will up quality and res as high as my pc or monitor will let me..

recording and making in game movies or trying to seriously compete in mp games is another story. i will lower res and maybe quality of graphics too. for added performance and speed. most any gaming pro trying to win can care less about eye candy. its just the facts. most lower his quality and res etc. and is another reason why i love my crt monitor. im not locked into some godless extra high fixed native res, that a lot of systems can barely run if the game is set to real high qualities. extra high res lcd's are great for glorified surfing of porn or office stuff. but playing hard on system games is another story. i laugh so hard when folks complain he cant max out quality settings and he is using some large wide screen lcd. well thats his own stupidity.

i love the fact i can lower my res and my game still looks nice and or i can max out in game quality settings.. just playing. ya. i can max out most of my games quality and monitor settings 1600x1200 @85hrz. but when im recording or competing in mp. i lower quality settings and res to 1024x768 @75hrz. and with my mobos built in lan and the speed of my connection and a lil tweaking using say tweak guides etc. all of my systems rock. i know in say ut04 mp. if the servers are not locked so all spawn in at the same time at game start. i normally spawn in first. and im on a rampage or better before most players even start the game. its not cheating if they are just standing there and i kill them. other players would do it to me. so..

on the day my crt breaks i will be really sad. i will pretty much be forced to buy a stupid lcd. id perfer none wide screen. but. you cant really buy crt's anymore. and then id have to settle for a fast lcd for gaming but might suck for most everything else or vise versa. get a good desk top lcd and suck for gaming and have ghosting etc.

have fun. see ya..

I'm tired of reading over and over how gameplay is more important than graphics because it's not. In my experience they must be equal. All of the best games that I have ever played not only had great gameplay but also were totting some of the best graphics for thier time. Think about your favorite games of all time and probably none of them have had bad graphics. Some of my favorites of all time Half-Life series, Goldeneye, Ocarina of Time, Grand Theft Auto Series, Final Fantasy, Bioshock, Crysis. All these games not only had some of the best graphics for thier time but had the gameplay to match it. And an equilibrium of the two is what makes great games turn into classics. 8BaLLCB

You're allowed to think that, I accept your opinion. There has been a noticable advance in graphics without an advance in gameplay over the years, I still like more games for SNES than any other system. I personally think new games can have less than stellar graphics as long as the gameplay is solid, I love the new megaman 9, but its graphics are on par with NES games even though its for wii, ps3, and 360. Of course this is my opinion too.

I'm tired of reading over and over how gameplay is more important than graphics because it's not. In my experience they must be equal. All of the best games that I have ever played not only had great gameplay but also were totting some of the best graphics for thier time. Think about your favorite games of all time and probably none of them have had bad graphics. Some of my favorites of all time Half-Life series, Goldeneye, Ocarina of Time, Grand Theft Auto Series, Final Fantasy, Bioshock, Crysis. All these games not only had some of the best graphics for thier time but had the gameplay to match it. And an equilibrium of the two is what makes great games turn into classics. 8BaLLCB

You're wrong, period.

Great gameplay is required to have a great game. Great graphics are not, end of story.

If great graphics were necessary, nobody would be playing anything by Blizzard or Valve and the whole world would be playing Crysis. Also, go check out how manypeople are playing trackmania.

I honestlycan'tbelieve that there's somebodyout there who doesn't think gameplay is far more important than graphics.

The sad thing is, I've had more fun with games on my Nintendo DS as of late than anything else. Probably because those games pretty much rely on good gameplay. They can't hope for impulse sales based on pretty graphics.zomglolcats

[QUOTE="zomglolcats"]The sad thing is, I've had more fun with games on my Nintendo DS as of late than anything else. Probably because those games pretty much rely on good gameplay. They can't hope for impulse sales based on pretty graphics.lordlors

some of the best games i played...the original hitman (Hitman codename 47), FF7, and FF10, Mount&Blade and Witcher come to mind (i'm still playing witcher though... its too good to finish).

I'd like to mention that the game i was most impressed with was M&B...and this was a month ago, the game has so many great ideas that graphics become completely unimportant...the animation is great and so is the gameplay, it has depth and its fun to play, thats the stuff i want in my games

[QUOTE="topsemag55"]

I disagree. You should include casual games as well, the ones who made their mark on gaming history.

Pac-Man has lousy graphics, but millions upon millions of people plugged quarters into those arcade machines. Then when the computer versions were made, everybody wanted it.

Donkey Kong, same thing.

FelipeInside

Nope, I had a lot of games that had better graphics than Pac-Man, but the gameplay was fun.

No need to debate this: You have your opinion, I have mine.:)

Earth Defense Force 2017 is one of my favorite xbox 360 games ever, and the graphics and animations were sketchy at best.

MangaJugs

HELLS YEAH.....one of the best and most addicting games that I have ever played. also one of the ugliest, but i enjoyed myself alot with that game

Umm yes it is I need some good gameplay only a good full of games have good graphics but not good gameplay,so I will always pick gameplay over graphics and most people will as well sorry..

So all those classic NES games must really suck then huh?

Gameplay? What's that? Games have been lacking lately in that gameplay gets forgotten for graphics. Unless a quicktime event with pushing the right button quickly to the screen is classed as gameplay.

Games need to have a mixture of both gameplay and graphics to succeed. Crysis almost got there, but nearly failed in that it had great PC graphics, but let down by console style gameplay. It was really just a follow the rails shooter. Stalker was great with gameplay in that it was more open world, but graphics let it down some. Combine both those games and you'd have the ultimate game.